Ringless spinning machine

ABSTRACT

A ringless spinning machine which has an air intake channel communicating with a rotatable spinning chamber operating at subatmospheric pressure. A combing roller having a plurality of saw teeth thereon as a part of the periphery exposed in the air intake channel so that air flowing therethrough can strip fibers from the peripheral surface of the combing roller. The junction defined by the wall surface on the fiber transfer side of the air intake channel at the forward end of the opening through which the combing roller projects and the wall surface of the space within which the combing roller rotates is in the form of a gently curved surface or a flat surface. A filter member having a filtering area larger than the area of the inlet end of the air intake channel is provided at said inlet end.

United States Patent Morikawa et al. [451 Oct. 10, 1972 1541 RINGLESSSPINNING MACHINE 3,018,603 1/1962 Rutz et al. ..57/56 72 I t Tam M mm3,360,917 l/l968 Kubovy m1 ..s7/ss.9s 1 80mm '1: 8 3,368,340 2/1968Barsukov 61311 ..s7/ss.s9 3,439,488 4/1969 13116116161 ..s1/ss.9s

gu Sumi, Fukui, Tohoru Unfu, Fu 3 44 k i; Manabu Y o u ,511,0

of Japan Assignees: Daiwa Boseki Kabushiki Kaisha,

Osaka, Japan; Kabushiki Kaisha; Toyoda Jidosholild" '56,

Kariya, Japan Filed: Nov. 14, 1969 Appl. N6; 876,918

Foreign Application Priority Data Nov. 27, 1968 Japan ..43/03802 US. Cl..57/58.95, 57/56 1111. c1. ..1)o111 1/12 Field 61 Search ..57/50, 56,58.89-58.95

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 7/1960 Bahnson, Jr. ..57/563/1961 Reiterer ..57/56 Primary Examiner-John PetrakesAttomey-Wenderoth, Lind & Ponack [57] ABSTRACT A ringless spinningmachine which has an air intake channel communicating with a rotatablespinning chamber operating at subatmospheric pressure. A combing rollerhaving a plurality of saw teeth thereon as a part of the peripheryexposed in the air intake channel so that air flowing therethrough canstrip fibers from the peripheral surface of the combing roller. Thejunction defined by the wall surface on the fiber transfer side of theair intake channel at the forward end of the opening through which thecombing roller projects and the wall surface of the space within whichthe combing roller rotates is in the form of a gently curved surface ora flat surface. A filter member having a filtering area larger than thearea of the inlet end of the air intake channel is provided at saidinlet end.

2 Claims, 10 Drawing Figures PKTENTEDnmwmn 3.695605 SHEET 1 UF 5 TAKASHIMORIKAWA, SOTOMATSU HIGAKE, MITSUGU SUMI,

TOHORU URIFU and MANABU YAMAMOTO,

lrwenfor 5 By AJAJLMMQ/ v Q Attorneys PATENTEDUBT 10 I972 SHEET 2 [IF 5TAKASHI RIKAWA, SOTOMAT HIGAKE,

MITSUGU SUMI, TOHORU URIFU and MANABU YAMAMOIO,

Inventor s M/MAM A itorneyS PATENfl-iflnm 10 m2 I 3.696; 605

SHEET 3 0F 5 TAKASHI MORIKAWA,

SOTOMATS IGAKE,

7 MITSUGU I,

TOHORU URIFU and MANABU YAMAMOTO,

Inventor s U Attorney PATENTEMW M 3.696Q605 SHEET 5 0F 5 TAKASHIMORIKAWA, SO'IOMATSU HIGAKE,

\. MITSUGU SUMI,

Z3 TOHORU URIFU and 24 MANABU YAMAMOTO,

Inventor M MW U A ltorncy s RINGLESS SPINNING MACHINE The presentinvention relates to an improvement in a ringless spinning machine ofthe type having a rotatable spinning chamber working undersubatmospheric pressure, a feed roller for fibrous material, a combingroller for opening and transferring fed fibrous material and an airintake channel communicating with the spinning chamber. The improvementis intended to increase the rate of transfer of fibers from theperipheral surface of the combing roller to the spinning chamber and toprevent the entry of short fibers, dust and other impurities through theinlet of the air intake channel communicating with the ambientatmosphere thereby to improve the quality of yarn being spun.

In a ringless spinning machine that has recently been put into practicaluse and particularly one operating on the principles of rotating aspinning chamber provided with an air discharge opening at high speed,utilizing the resulting internal subatmospheric pressure to allow air toflow in through an air intake channel, and stripping fibers from theperipheral surface of a combing roller to transfer them to the spinningchamber by means of said air flow, there is an undesirable phenomenon inwhich the rate of' stripping (or the rate of transfer) of fibers fromthe peripheral surface of the combing roller, which is provided with anumber of saw teeth, is considerably reduced to the extent that a partof the fibers are fed back to the fiber supply side without beingstripped, thus deteriorating the quality of spun yarn.

Further, short fibers, dust and other impurities floating in the ambientatmosphere tend to flow into the air intake channel performing thefunction of transfer of fibers to the spinning chamber, so that suchimpurities are conveyed to the spinning chamber. As a result, in caseswhere the mass of said impurities is small and the amount is also small,they will be discharged together with air through the air dischargeopening in the spinning chamber, but in cases where a large amount ofimpurities flow in, even if the mass itself is small, or whereimpurities having a large mass, e.g. fragments of leaves, flow in, thereis the drawback that they are centrifugally pressed against the fibercollecting surface of the spinning chamber together with fibers.

The present invention has as the principal object remedying the twodrawbacks described above, and provides a ringless spinning machinecomprising an air intake channel communicating with a rotatable spinningchamber working under subatmospheric pressure, and a combing rollerprovided with a number of saw teeth and having the peripheral surfacethereof partly exposed to said air intake channel to cause fibers to bestripped from the peripheral surface of the combing roller by means ofair flow, said ringless spinning machine being characterized in that thefront end of a junction defined by the wall surface on the fibertransfer side of the air intake channel adjacent the opening throughwhich the peripheral surface of the combing roller is exposed, and bythe wall surface of the main body enclosing the peripheral surface ofthe combing roller is in the form of a gently curved surface or a flatsurface, and that a filter member having a filtering area larger thanthe area of the opening at the inlet of the air intake channel isprovided at said inlet.

In the accompanying drawings:

FIG. 1 is a cross-section of a spinning part of a conventional ringlessspinning machine;

FIG. 2 is a cross-section of the fiber stripping part shown in FIG. 1;

FIGS. 3 and 4 are cross-sections each showing an improved stripping partaccording to the present invention;

FIGS. 5, 6 and 7 are cross-sections each showing a filter member at theinlet of an air intake channel according to the present invention;

FIG. 8 is a front view of the box-type filter shown in FIG. 7;

FIG. 9 is a cross-section taken along the line A-A of FIG. 8; and

FIG. 10 is a perspective view showing the box-type filter shown in FIG.8 removably attached to a spinning unit of a ringless spinning machine.

Referring to the drawings, a ringless spinning machine such as shown inFIG. 1 is known which comprises a rotatable spinning chamber 1 workingunder subatmospheric pressure, an air intake channel 3 communicatingwith said spinning chamber 1 and having an air intake opening 2 on theambient atmosphere side, a combing roller 5 provided with a number ofsaw teeth 4 and having the peripheral surface thereof partly exposed tosaid air intake channel through an opening into said channel, and a feedroller 7 for feeding a fibrous material 6. As shown in FIG. 2, the fiberstripping part for stripping fibers from the peripheral surface of thecombing roller 5 in the spinning part of such ringless spinning machinehas a junction 11 in the form of a knife edge, said junction beingdefined by the wall surface 8 on the fiber feed side of the air intakechannel adjacent to and on the downstream side of the opening throughwhich the peripheral surface of said combing roller 5 is exposed, and bythe wall surface 10 of a main body 9 enclosing the peripheral surface ofthe combing roller 5. Further, the extent to which a part of theperipheral surface of the combing roller 5 is allowed to enter the airintake channel 3 is limited, and the distance between the front end ofthe knife edgeshaped junction 11 and the summit of the combing roller 5exposed to the air intake channel 3, where fibers are subjected tosubstantial stripping action, is very short. As a result, there occurs aphenomenon in which the edge of the junction 11 becomes worn andscratched as a result of contact with fibers being transferred at highspeed. Such knife edge-shaped junction 11 has been considered desirablefor carrying out the function of stripping fibers from the peripheralsurface of the combing roller 5, but in practice it is stillinsufficient in that a part of the fibers on the combing roller is fedback to the feed roller 7; it has been found that the amount of materialfed back is as large as 8 15 percent.

A first object of the invention is to remedy the aforementioned trouble.According to the invention, there is provided a ringless spinningmachine having spinning parts such as shown in FIG. 1, characterized inthat as shown in FIGS. 3 and 4 the front end of the junction 11 definedby the wall surface 8 on the fiber feed side of an air intake channel 3adjacent to and on the downstream side of the opening through which theperipheral surface of a combing roller 5 is exposed, and by the wallsurface 10 of a main body 9 enclosing the peripheral surface of thecombing roller 5 is in the form of a gently curved surface 12 or a fiatsurface 13 substantially orthogonal to a tangent to the peripheralsurface of the combing roller 5.

Since the front end of the junction 11 at a position where fibers arestripped from the peripheral surface of the combing roller for transferto the groove 3, has such a gently curved surface 12 or flat surface 13,the circumferential air flow due to the high speed rotation of thecombing roller 5 impinges against the curved surface 12 or flat surface13 of said junction 11, thereby creating a back pressure in a directionopposite to the direction of rotation of the combing roller 5, whichback pressure acts on the saw teeth 4 of the combing roller 5 exposed tothe air intake channel 3 to raise the fibers gripped by the saw teeth 4so that the stripping of the fibers under the action of a suction forceexerted by the rotatable spinning chamber 1 is accelerated, resulting ina remarkable increase in the rate of stripping and transfer of fibers,and the amount of fibers fed back to the feed roller 7 can be reducedalmost to zero. Moreover, since the distance between the summit of thecombing roller exposed to the air intake channel 3, where substantialstripping of fibers takes place, and the front end of the junction isrelatively large, stripping of relatively long fibers becomes easy.Thus, the junction 1 1 according to the invention is not a knife edgebut the curved surface 12 or flat surface 13, which has an appreciablethickness, as described above, and clashing of fibers against saidsurfaces 12 and 13 can be avoided by the influence of said backpressure, so that damage to said surfaces 12 and 13 is reduced, thusassuring a long service life. Further, the aforementioned merit of sharpreduction in the amount of return fibers makes uniform the amount offibers transferred to the spinning chamber 1 and prevents unevenness ofthe yarn.

Reference will now be made to FIGS. 1 and 5-10.

In a ringless spinning machine known per se such as shown in FIG. 1 andparticularly a spinning apparatus operating on the principle of rotatinga spinning chamber 1 with an air discharge opening 15 at high speed,utilizing the resultant internal subatmospheric pressure to introducefibers from a combing roller 5 to an air intake channel 3, andtransferring fibers to the spinning chamber 1 by means of air currentsflowing into the spinning chamber from the ambient atmosphere, thetransfer air which transfers fibers into the spinning chamber 1 asdescribed above is taken in from a room in which the spinning machine isinstalled. Therefore, fly, dust and other impurities (hereinafterreferred to simply as impurities) floating in the air in the room aresucked together with the air into the spinning chamber 1 through the airintake channel 3. As a result, in cases where the mass of the impuritiesis small and the amount is also small, they would be discharged togetherwith the air, but in cases where a large amount of impurities flow in,even if the mass itself is small, or where impurities of large mass(e.g. fragments of leaves) are sucked into the spinning chamber 1through said air intake channel 3, they are centrifugally pressedagainst the collecting surface 16 of the spinning chamber 1 togetherwith fibers and migrate into the spun yarn or stick to the fibercollecting surface 16, thereby causing the unevenness of yarn andbreakage of yarn.

A second object of the invention is to eliminate the aforementioneddrawback. According to the invention,

a filter member 20 having a filtering area larger than the area of theopening at the inlet of the air intake channel 3 for introducing airinto the spinning chamber 1 is provided at said inlet 2. FIGS. 5 and 6show examples in which a filter member 20 made of a continuous foam bodyis attached to the inlet 2 of the air intake channel 3. FIGS. 7 10 showan example in which a filter member is box-shaped and removably attachedto the inlet 2 of said channel 3. In this case, the filter is a metallicnet 21 of fine mesh which may be reinforced by a frame 22 and supportedby guides 23 and 24 so that it can be easily exchanged for a new one.

According to the invention shown particularly in FIGS. 7 10, it ispossible to prevent impurities floating in the room form migrating tothe spinning chamber 1, and besides, there are very useful merits asfollows.

Since the filtering area is much larger than the area of the opening atthe inlet of the air intake channel, a long period of use is assured.Further, because of the detachable mounting system, cleaning andexchange can be readily carried out if clogging of the mesh shouldoccur.

As described above, according to a spinning part of a ringless spinningmachine of the invention, the occurrence of breakage of yarn andunevenness of yarn is less than that in the conventional apparatus ofthis kind and spun yarn of more uniform quality can be obtained.

What we claim is:

1. In a ringless spinning machine having a spinning chamber workingunder subatmospheric pressure, a combing roller, a body having an airintake channel communicating with said spinning chamber and enclosingsaid combing roller, said combing roller having saw teeth and saidchannel having an opening through which part of the periphery of thecombing roller is exposed so that fibers are stripped from theperipheral surface of the combing roller, that improvement comprisingthe junction between the portion of the body facing and enclosing theperiphery of the combing roller and the portion of the wall of the airintake channel on the downstream side of the opening through which thecombing roller is exposed being a flat surface extending generallytransverse to the circumference of the combing roller.

2. In a ringless spinning machine having a spinning chamber workingunder subatmospheric pressure, a combing roller, a body having an airintake channel communicating with said spinning chamber and enclosingsaid combing roller, said combing roller having saw teeth and saidchannel having an opening through which part of the periphery of thecombing roller is exposed so that fibers are stripped from theperipheral surface of the combing roller, that improvement comprisingthe junction between the portion of the body facing and enclosing theperiphery of the combing roller and the portion of the wall of the airintake channel on the downstream side of the opening through which thecombing roller is exposed being a flat surface extending generallytransverse to the circumference of the combing roller and a filtermember in a form of a box structure removably attached over the inletend of said air intake channel and having a filtering area larger thanthe area of said inlet opening for filtering the air entering said airintake channel.

1. In a ringless spinning machine having a spinning chamber workingunder subatmospheric pressure, a combing roller, a body having an airintake channel communicating with said spinning chamber and enclosingsaid combing roller, said combing roller having saw teeth and saidchannel having an opening through which part of the periphery of thecombing roller is exposed so that fibers are stripped from theperipheral surface of the combing roller, that improvement comprisingthe junction between the portion of the body facing and enclosing theperiphery of the combing roller and the portion of the wall of the airintake channel on the downstream side of the opening through which thecombing roller is exposed being a flat surface extending generallytransverse to the circumference of the combing roller.
 2. In a ringlessspinning machine having a spinning chamber working under subatmosphericpressure, a combing roller, a body having an air intake channelcommunicating with said spinning chamber and enclosing said combingroller, said combing roller having saw teeth and said channel having anopening through which part of the periphery of the combing roller isexposed so that fibers are stripped from the peripheral surface of thecombing roller, that improvement comprising the junction between theportion of the body facing and enclosing the periphery of the combingroller and the portion of the wall of the air intake channel on thedownstream side of the opening through which the combing roller isexposed being a flat surface extending generally transverse to thecircumference of the combing roller and a filter member in a form of abox structure removably attached over the inlet end of said air intakechannel and having a filtering area larger than the area of said inletopening for filtering the air entering said air intake channel.